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Silly Sisters: Singing the Travels

[Trad. arr. Prior / Tabor]

Maddy Prior, June Tabor, vocals;
Martin Carthy, guitar, drum;
Danny Thompson, bass;
Johnny Moynihan, bouzouki;
Andy Irvine, mandolin

Maddy Prior and June Tabor recorded this mummers play song for their album Silly Sisters. Another, live recording from the Maddy Prior, Family & Friends Christmas tour of 1999 was released on the CD and video Ballads and Candles.

This song is part of the medieval mummers play The Seven Champions of Christendom from Symondsbury near Bridport, Dorset, and is a heated discussion about the merits or otherwise of being employed or independent. In Shakespeare's time most English villages had their local amateur acting companies, who on Christmas or Plough Monday performed traditional dramas in the streets or the halls of great houses. This custom has now almost died out. Peter Kennedy recorded on Christmas 1951 in Symondsbury a fragment of revived but genuine version of this play which has been included in the Alan Lomax Collection CD World Library of Folk and Primitive Music: England.

Lyrics

Well met, my brothers dear, all along the highway riding
So solemn I was walking along
So pray come tell to me what calling yours may be
And I'll have you for a servant man.

Some serving men do eat the very best of meat
Such as cock, goose, capon and swan
But when lords and ladies dine, they drink strong beer, ale and wine
That's some diet for a servant man.

Don't you talk about your capons, let's have some rusty bacon
And aye, a good piece of pickled pork
That's always in my house, a crust of bread and cheese
That's some diet for a husband man.

When next to church they go with their livery fine and gay
And their cocked hats and gold lace all around
With their shirts as white as milk, and stitched as fine as silk
That's some habit for a servant man.

Don't you talk about your livery nor all your silken garments
That's not fit for to travel the bushes in.
Give me my leather coat, aye, and in my purse a groat
That's some habit for a husband man.

So me must needs confess that your calling is the best
And will give you the uppermost hand
So now we won't delay but pray both night and day
God bless the honest husband man.